Draco's Detour
by superguy
Summary: After serving time after Potions to up his grade, Draco Malfoy discovers something about one of his classmates that sparks his interest greatly.


Draco's Detour

_I am going crazy here wondering what is in store for Draco, since he is my favorite character. So, I thought I'd try my own hand at coming up with something. Since I recently got in trouble for some copyright issues, I am not claiming that this is an actual _Harry Potter_ chapter, nor am I making any money off the posting of it and mean absolutely no harm in any way to any individual. Thanks._

_-superguy_

The lights of Hogwarts Castle had dimmed and the sounds of crickets could be heard in choruses through many of the open windows. Most students found that the day had been monotonous – teachers grinding pointless handwritten notes into their minds. However, with the end of classes and the start of dinner in the Great Hall, light chatter began floating through the voluminous corridors of the castle.

Not everybody was cheerful, though. Deep below the castle's Great Hall down four flights of stone steps was Draco Malfoy. A boy with pale, stretched features and icy-blonde hair slicked back with grease, the boy was the only presence found in that wing of the castle besides the Potions Master, Professor Snape.

Due to his lack of effort in the double Potions lesson of the day, Draco had been ordered to remain in the dark dungeon classroom for some extra tutelage. Draco, however much he wanted to converse with his classmates about pointless topics, was not in the position to decline so found himself in the aforementioned situation.

The echoing bell signaling the end of classes had tolled not long before, Draco had been sitting at one of the old, grimy desks for ten minutes, anxiously awaiting Snape to enter and to be finished with the assignment. The greasy-haired, drawling professor had left not five minutes before; advising Draco to stay put while he collected something from his personal stores.

So, Draco waited patiently with nothing but the darkness of the dimly lit dungeon and the occasional drip of unseen water for company. It was during this time that he found the chance to sort out his thoughts.

He realized it had been a long day for everyone (the start of first-term classes always was), but it had been exceptionally lengthy for him in particular. Not only had he been practically abandoned by his fellow Slytherin classmates during breakfast, but also he hadn't received the letter from his father like Lucius had promised him. It was before he had left on the Hogwarts Express that his father promised him a letter telling him how things were going back at the Manor, but Draco had eaten breakfast with no friends and no letter.

What was going on with people? Did everything change overnight?

Shifting his weight on the desk, he tried to get more comfortable. Slouching forward, he rested his cheek on the fleshy side of his fist, relieved that there were no prying eyes to scrutinize him, as there would have been at the Manor. Heavily lidded eyes aroused a deep yawn as he felt himself slowly drifting off…

Slam!

Jumping from the sudden noise, Draco's cheek slipped off his fist and his head fell forward onto the desk, his jaw connecting with the hard wood surface with a crack. Eyes now watering with the pain of his ground teeth, Draco glanced up to see Snape striding confidently down the rows of desks with a large parcel under his arm, wand in the opposite free hand.

"Dozing off, I see," the man started, waving his wand at the blackboard. "Tut, tut, Mr. Malfoy."

Draco, still massaging his sore chin, remained silent. It was often that he found himself unable to rebut on comments from teachers. This liberty came when he was with his classmates and peers, but teachers held a higher power that he dared not toil with. He'd already crossed the line his first year, and his father hadn't let him forget it. The serpent-headed staff had made doubly sure of that.

Snape had set the parcel (wrapped in an old brown paper, laced with twine) on his desk and was now filling the cauldron at the front of the class with his wand. Unable to decide whether to sit or to stand, Draco remained seated until Snape glanced down at him from the front.

"Hurry up and get over here." the man seemed to snarl, as though he expected Draco to read his thoughts. Draco did so, not wanting the wrath that lesser students had to put up with. Snape's eyes watched the dark liquid swirling in the cauldron as he spoke again. "That was a ridiculous show in class today, Malfoy. I expect better from you, as you should know."

"I know," Draco started, uncomfortably. "I'm just tired, that's all."

"Well, when your N.E.W.T.S. come up, sleep will be the least of your problems. Since I'm your house advisor, I thought I'd take the liberty of showing you where you went wrong."

The usually livid professor seemed kinder now, something the students rarely saw during class. It was as though the man put up a front to intimidate, but behind the scenes he was just a man like everyone else at the school. But the temper was definitely abnormal. Snape hadn't mocked Draco openly as he had done to other students who had failed, but on sight of the black pitch that Draco had managed to produce, the man's eyes held disappointment that was stronger than any spoken word.

"In case you haven't noticed," Snape went on, "the potions you and your classmates are required to produce are getting gradually and gradually more difficult. I am aiming the course to a higher level of potion making that the previous, _lower_ classes can't grasp."

Draco looked up to the blackboard and watched as the enchanted chalk wrote in Snape's neat cursive penmanship, _Add two handfuls of Horklump Extract to cauldron of neutralized H20 and stir_.

Snape looked down his long, pointed nose at the cauldron, which had now boiled to the point where gigantic black bubbles were continuing to break the surface in slopping masses.

"Now," Snape went on. "Do what the board instructs carefully. Your aim is to create a potion that will shrink you or the drinker, not shrivel them up until they are unrecognizable."

Draco nodded and started adding the ingredients carefully, making sure to double check the board to see that he was in fact doing everything correctly. The last thing he needed was to be lectured further and have to waste more time in the dreadful surrounds that was the dungeon.

After about a half-hour, Draco found the potion to be complete.

Picking up a goblet from Snape's desk, he dipped the brim into the frothing now purple potion and walked it up to the professor who was correcting essays. Draco caught a glimpse of Harry's messy scrawl and tried to suppress a groan. He knew that Potter would be doing far worse than he in the class would, even though it was already a struggle for the Slytherin.

With thorough inspection, Snape nodded, taking the goblet from Draco and setting it on the table before him, consulting his checklist of markings.

"Good…good…there's a fine amount of steam rising from it…that's a good sign…and the color is a nice egg plant. Well done. I expect more like this in class. You may go now."

Draco grinned. Finally.

"Thank-you, Professor."

And with that, he started out of the dungeon, grabbing his bag off the desk before leaving. At last he could go to the common room and just relax. It had been a hard day for him, after all.

The corridors were strangely quiet. This was something he wasn't used to. Usually there were many students lingering all over the place, doing stupid activities like playing Gobstones or practicing for Transfiguration lessons. Tonight there was no one.

Draco found the sound of his footsteps echoing off the walls eerie and disconcerting. He'd be at the Slytherin portrait soon enough.

But before he got to the Slytherin portrait, something caught his eye. The sound of footsteps hurrying down the corridor he had just passed came to him and he had to stop and see who it was. What was there to run about at this time of the evening?

Taking a few steps back, Draco glanced down the adjacent corridor lined with falcon-shaped sconces supporting brilliant torches. The sound of footsteps was already fading down the corridor, but to Draco's surprise, there was nobody making them. The hallway was completely empty.

"Huh?" Draco muttered to himself. He swore he had seen a shadow on the wall where a person would be, but there was nobody.

Turning down the corridor, his curiosity getting the better of him, he decided to follow the footsteps and see whom they belonged to.

It didn't take long before the footsteps slowed. The hallway connected with another. Draco took a right and started up a flight of spiral stairs and continued to follow until the steps stopped at a portrait he had never seen before.

Lingering behind a stone pillar, Draco watched as the fat lady in the painting snored loudly.

"What's all this about?" Draco muttered quietly to himself as he spotted the shadow on the floor before the portrait. Then, the sound of a voice came from before him.

"_Horkypunk_."

The fat lady seemed to stir and swung her frame forward revealing a round opening in the wall. The sound of scrapings was heard, and Draco took it the invisible student (he guessed it was a student) was crawling through the hole. Before long, the portrait swung back, hiding the opening and leaving the scene lucid once more.

Did he just see what he thought he saw?

No. It couldn't be.

But then again – this was the opportunity of a lifetime! The Gryffindor Common Room! He could sneak into it and see what it was like! Was it really better than the green confines Draco went to sleep to every evening? He could finally have something worthy of bragging to his classmates about. But what if he got caught?

_Who cares!_ Draco thought to himself as he strode cautiously forward, trying to hide his Hogwarts badge pinned to the breast of his black robes. Perhaps the fat lady wouldn't notice that he was a Slytherin.

"Ahem…" Draco cleared his throat, getting the lady's attention. She stirred and yawned.

"P-p-p-pasword?" she stuttered, putting a brush-stroked hand over her mouth.

"Uh – well…" Draco started, still unsure if he wanted to go through with it. But, the thought of seeing Potter and where he slept secretly was too great a pull on him, and he hurriedly blurted the word. "_Horkypunk_."

"You may pass," the lady muttered and the portrait swung forward.

Inside, Draco was cheering with glee. Finally, he was doing something all the Slytherins only dreamed of doing in their best dreams! The hole was a tight squeeze, but he made it through and slipped secretly into the circular common room. A gigantic grate was beneath the stone of a fireplace and a bulletin board was covered with postings, making it appear more like a quilt constructed of paper than a message board.

Everything was so quaint it almost made Draco sick looking at it all.

Now that he was inside the circular room, he had no idea what to do next. Of course, this was the greatest thing that had ever happened to him. Who among the Slytherins could say they had seen the inside of the Gryffindor Common Room?

Then he spotted it: The spiral staircase that would lead to the sleeping Gryffindors' rooms.

Striding confidently forward, Draco took the first step.

He hoped more than ever that nobody would come out of their rooms and see him. He was brave, but he didn't know how well it would go with Dumbledore if he was caught spying on another House.

What in the world was he looking for?

_Something_, he thought to himself. There had to be something he could see.

Someone's room, he thought eagerly. But whose?

The sound of a door closing made Draco jump. Slipping back against the curvature of the stone wall, Draco waited in silence and darkness until he was sure there was nobody on the stairs with him.

That had been a close one. But who had just entered a dorm?

_The invisible person!_ Draco thought to himself as he hurried up the stairs. Maybe he could find out who it was.

Sure enough, he spotted the door slightly open. It must not have latched when it was closed. This gave Draco a perfect view of whoever was inside the room.

To his surprise, he could see nobody except for the few sleeping within the confines of their four poster beds. But there was noise. What in the world was going on?

Suddenly the air seemed to be pulled apart and a hand appeared floating in mid air! This startled Draco and he stepped back. But then the air rippled again and a body slipped out of nowhere. The body was of a boy that Draco knew very well.

"Potter?"

He couldn't believe what he was seeing. Potter just appeared out of nowhere! It was almost eerie in a way. The boy with dark hair and rounded spectacles was folding something in his hands. On closer inspection when Harry turned just so, Draco saw that there was writing on it. The writing looked from the distance that Draco was to be moving. Almost like a scrolling marquee he had once seen in the Muggle world. But these words weren't created by lights as the Muggle ones had been. These words were just ink scrawls across the page.

Then in one unexpected fleeting moment, Harry looked towards the door and Draco jumped. He could have sworn he was caught for sure. Potter's eyes darted down to the floor and back up as if noticing something was remiss. But after a second of just stares, Harry strode over to the door and closed it with a simple shove of his palm.

Sighing in relief, Draco watched as he was left once again in darkness. Having had enough, he started back down the stairs. It was his intention to get out before any more close calls happened.

Hurrying through the common room, weaving in and out of comfy chairs, Draco made a beeline for the portrait hole. Slipping through, he made his way hurriedly back down the staircase towards the Slytherin tower.

Perhaps he would keep what he had seen to himself.

_finis_


End file.
